biography

Garous Abdolmalekian is only 18 days younger than the Iran-Iraq war. He was born on 10th of October 1980 in west of Tehran. The reference to the poet’s birthday is significant since on a closer look at his poetry one can perceive the effects of the devastating long war that lived in his creative subconscious. These effects often surface in his poetry disguised in hidden cues and literary meanings.

He has grown up in a literary and poetry loving family, his father Mohammad Reza Abdolmalekian is a well-known poet for the past four decades and he has published a number of books during this time. Garous began writing at the age of 11 and his first poems were published in well-established children’s magazines and later in youth literature and poetry magazines and newsletters.

As he mentions, from 1997 he began studying literary criticism and theories and produced his first serious poems, which were published in academic journals and in broadly circulating periodicals such as Karname and Asr e Panjshanbe. These works later became part of his first book.

Garous published his first book “The Hidden Bird” in 2002 which was awarded one of the most important and notable literature prizes in Iran.

Garous then graduated from Tehran Azad University in Industrial engineering in 2003.

His second book “The Faded Colours of the World” came out in 2005 and later in 2008 “Lines Changes Places in the Dark” was published by Morvarid publishing house.

Garous has been the recipient of many prestigious national and international literary awards such as:

In 2000 he began collaborating with the Youth Poetry office and their editorial group until 2007. The Youth Poetry Office is one of the most respected and experienced literary agents in Iran. In 2007 Garous broadened his creative activities and became involved in planning and organizing literature classes, workshops and seminars with major literary figures such as: Zia Movahhed, Mohammad Ali Sepanlou, Shams Langeroudi, Ahmad Pouri, Hosein Payandeh, Mostafa Rahmandoost, Abbas Mokhber.

In 2010 Garous Abdolmalekian was invited to join Cheshmeh Publishing House as a director for its poetry section, a post he is still holding.

Garous Abdolmalekian’s passion for literature goes beyond writing poems and literary critiques; he is also a keen speaker and lecturer in literature. He frequently organizes poetry workshops where he teaches poetry writings. He has held many such workshops in different cultural centers in Tehran such as Book City, Mellal Farhangsara, Tajrish, Allameh university, Shahid Beheshti university...etc. Also, he has given lectures on broad subjects such as modern Iran and Western literature, in Tehran university, Shahid Beheshti university, Sanati Isfahan university, Amir Kabir university, Azad university and other Higher education institutes.

In 2011 Garous Abdolmalekian published another book titled “Hollows” that was published by Cheshmeh publication. The book was very well-received and sold more than15000 copies in a short while.

Over the years, Garous’s poems and books have been very positively received by major reviewers and authors, making him a well-established young poet of today’s Iran.

Last year the poet of the “Hollows” produced another book titled “Nothing is as fresh as death”, an artistic combination of poetry and photographic images where his poems accompanied the photographs taken by 36 prolific artists from Iran.

Garous’s poems have been widely translated into many languages such as: Kurdish, Arabic, English, German, French and others. The following are a selection of his publications:

"The Faded Colours of the World" in Kurdish. Sulaymaniyah, Iraq, 2008.

Also, many of Garous’s poems have appeared in international literary and poetry magazines and websites, such as:

Lyrikline,

UniVerse (United Nation Poetry site),

Europe,

Circulodepoesia, …

Garous Abdolmalekian has had an active presence in many International Poetry Festivals such as International Poetry festival in France in 2011, The World’s Poets Festival in Iran and The Gelavizh Poetry Festival.